Teesside University

DTP MPCS Solution reduces student costs by £6,000 a month at Teesside University

About Teesside University         

Situated in Middlesbrough in the North East of England, Teesside University has been in existence for 75 years and is now ranked as one of the country's top universities. With 2,000 staff, it caters for 10,000 full-time students and 18,000 part-timers.

Students and staff print over half a million pages a month so the University needs an efficient way to both charge students for
their 300,000 pages a month and to re-charge 250,000 staff prints a month back to the appropriate schools and departments.

The old Palms charging system was out-dated and required three separate devices; a PC, a printer and a copier, which lead to long queues. The system was also becoming expensive and difficult to support and the University believed that it could dramatically improve the student experience while still achieving significant savings.

Change to multifunction
              

Using the North Eastern Universities Purchasing Consortium (NEUPC) and Managed Print & Copy Services specialist, The DTP Group, Teesside matched available vendor solutions to its need for reliability and quality and found that HP Multifunction Printers (MFP) most closely matched those requirements. Because of the ease of integration with HP MFPs, a SafeCom charging and print management system was also incorporated.

"We chose HP MFPs because of the functionality they gave us," says Janet Smith, Assistant Director of ICT systems at Teesside University. "Scan-to-email is a really useful function that was not available on our previous system and the ability to make copies on the printer also reduces the number of devices that we have to run and support." - John Smith 

Teesside worked with The DTP Group and SafeCom on a campus-wide deployment of MFPs linked to existing back office systems. Now, 51 devices have been installed including a mix of HP LaserJet 4345 MFPs, HP Colour LaserJet 4730 MFPs and HP Colour LaserJet CM6040 MFPs. Broadly, there is one device per building but 13 are installed in the Library where 75% of printing is done and 11 are in staff-only areas.

Streamlined charging        

The system includes SafeCom charging and management software,money loaders and integrated card readers. Students can top up their accounts through the cashier's office or by using one of the money loaders situated around the University. Web-based payment is also being introduced. Students swipe their identity card to collect print jobs at any of the MFPs around the campus and the charge is automatically deducted from their account. Staff members use a similar card system but do not pay. Their print costs are re-charged to the appropriate departments.

Teesside's new system is provided under a three year Managed Print & Copy Services (MPCS) contract from The DTP Group. This includes a standard quarterly rental for the devices with a fixed click charge for each page printed. Software, consumables, maintenance and support are also rolled in and DTP remotely monitors the machines for fault and toner alerts using HP Web Jetadmin software.

Opting for a Managed Print Service provided by The DTP Group offers Teesside a number of important benefits including significant capital cost savings, a single point of contact, reduced administration and simplified day-to-day management.

Student satisfaction up 

"A huge benefit is the ability to obtain statistical reports from the system. It has revolutionised staff printing because managers are now able to see who printed what, where and at what cost. Previously it was not possible to attribute costs in this way," adds Smith. "We now have a better understanding of what people are printing and how much they are printing so we can build up a profile which enables us to audit usage and use this to refine the deployment."

"The card system also enables users to print confidential documents, eliminating the need for us to buy and maintain individual printers."

"Although we have not produced any figures, we know that there was an instant saving on wasted paper. With the previous system, a lot of uncollected print jobs were left piled on the machines and now we do not have that. Also, when you consider that we have reduced PCs, printers and photocopiers to single MFPs, we are using less power, which also brings environmental advantages."

An area where Teesside has produced figures is in the overall cost of print. Previously, it estimated that the cost of one page of print was five pence. With the new MPS system, that has been reduced to three pence which equates to a saving of £6,000 a month for student print alone. Applying the same savings to staff print means further savings of £5,000 a month, resulting in a total savings of £11,000 a month.

"We do not want to make a profit out of students so the savings have been passed on to them through reduced print costs," says Smith. "If any money is still left over it is also ploughed back into the system to improve services."

Results

IT improvements

• Single point of contact for maintenance issues, reduced administration and simplified  day-to-day management.

• MFPs mean a smaller fleet with lower energy bills and emissions.

• Statistical reporting supports more efficient printer usage and deployment.

Business benefits

• Print costs have been reduced by £132,000 and the savings passed on to students, reducing their print costs by £72,000 per year.
  
• Student satisfaction increased by 15% in a recent survey.
  
• Significant capital outlay has been saved and paper wastage has been reduced.

Implementing a DTP Managed Print Service with HP multifunction products and SafeCom print management has enabled us to provide a better service for students while reducing their print charges by 40%. Janet Smith, assistant director of ICT systems, Teesside University "Implementing this new system with HP MFP devices has improved the print service we offer to students with additional benefits such as scan to email and integral photocopying and reduced queues. In a recent print survey, student satisfaction had risen by 15%, a great reason to choose a DTP MFP based Managed Print & Copy Service," concludes Smith.